Avoidable Tragedy

This tragic and bizarre story emerges from the past of Amy Bishop, the apparent killer of three at University of Alabama Hunstville.

It appears Dr. Bishop held a shotgun that discharged and killed her younger brother in 1986.  She was nineteen at the time. An unspeakable tragedy, attributed as an accident at the time.

We'll probably never know 'why' the Huntsville tragedy took place. None of us are exempt from tragedy, or from the possibility that something this bizarre may indeed visit our lives; that we or someone we love may fall victim to an evil act.  Perhaps more tragically, someone we love and think we know may perpetrate some tragedy. Perhaps, even ourselves.  It can be scary to contemplate, and hopefully breeds humility in us all. Absent grace, we all are capable of anything.

We can't know the individual stories and family histories of every person in every room we enter.  As one old Presbyterian preacher once quipped: 'If you knew everything about me, you wouldn't want to be in those pews. If I knew everything about you, I wouldn't want to be in this pulpit!' And, since we all fail, we should not be obligated to live our lives defined only by our failures and tragedies. OS has seen this happen, and it almost happened to him along the way. Without grace, all lives grind to a halt.

That said, however...

Guns are designed to not discharge by accident. It requires several deliberate acts to load a shotgun of any design, chamber the shell, disengage the safety, and pull the trigger. They are designed for safety, to be operated by responsible people who are trained to them. OS is so grateful he grew up shooting, always supervised. He knew they weren't toys.

Yet, accidents can and do happen. They are chains of events, in reality. Leave a loaded firearm within reach of an untrained young person  who doesn't understand the dangers, and...you've taken at least two of the deliberate safety steps out of the process. OS's childhood next-door neighbor was a police detective, a grizzled veteran. When he came home from work, he stepped into the house. His first act was always to unload his service revolver in the sight of all. The revolver went to one side of the room, out of reach of any child, and the cartridges went to the other side of the room, out of reach of any child.

It was his ritual. He never failed to observe it.

A terrible tragedy later visited his home, but it was not the tragedy of one of his sons killing the other.

How did the tragedy of 1986 set the stage for the tragedy of 2010? We'll never know, really.
Was 1986 an accident, or an act of evil? We'll never know, twenty-four years removed. And to exhaustively re-examine the question only increases the agony for the innocent members of that family.

In the meantime, OS has an aging neighbor with macular degeneration, prone to depression. Who owns a pistol with a rather complicated safety. Which now sits, unloaded, clip out, in OS's closet. He checked it himself, twice. The shells are in the pickup truck.

OS is a proud NRA member, and plans to get his carry permit this year.

He doesn't want this particular, avoidable, tragedy to visit his house. Or subsequent tragedies to visit someone else's house in 2034.

Please, if you have weapons, think things through. Get proper training. If the 'bird on your shoulder' tells you that someone in your world has both weapons and a personal crisis underway, quietly intervene. If you are that person in crisis, park your weapon with a friend for a while, OK? The crisis will pass. OS did it about twenty years ago. Don't ask why.

N.B.--The biathlon coverage of Winter Olympics just began. A combination skiing/shooting event.
The competitors undergo a rifle safety check just before they are sent onto the course.

'Nuff said.